


to light (his) way home

by Raimei



Category: Star Wars Episode VII: The Force Awakens (2015)
Genre: Gen, Hurt/Comfort, I’m sorry, Jealousy, M/M, Pining, The First Order’s A+ Parenting, Whump, i mean it’s like mild jealousy I guess but still tagging for it
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-12-18
Updated: 2017-12-18
Packaged: 2019-02-16 13:05:43
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,876
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13054596
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Raimei/pseuds/Raimei
Summary: With all his kriffing experience with Kylo Ren’s temper tantrums, Finn really should have known that getting tangled up with Force users was a bad idea, Poe thinks to himself as he sprints over to the Falcon and Finn.——-Set between Force Awakens and The Last Jedi. Will warn for spoilers if/when I catch up to TLJ timeline. Poe-centric. Finn sleeps, while Poe repairs his jacket and worries incessantly about his recovery and Rey’s place in Finn’s life. Canon-adjacent.





	to light (his) way home

_With all his kriffing experience with Kylo Ren’s temper tantrums, Finn really should have known that getting tangled up with Force users was a bad idea_ , Poe thinks to himself as he sprints over to the Falcon and Finn, where he sees a brown form being lowered onto the back of a transport by the tall, shuffling, somewhat drooping figure of Han Solo’s Wookiee copilot. He elbows a couple of slow walkers out of the way, seeing out of the corner of his eye the General and the girl - Rey, BB-8 had called her - embracing, in tears, and tries to put it out of his mind as he shoves his way to the fore. 

“He’s injured-“ he hears. 

“We’ve got a heartbeat!” interjects another voice urgently, as Poe catches the leather of his jacket’s sleeve and worries it between his fingers for the brief second before the transport jerks Finn’s ashen form away from him. He jogs to keep up, feeling the weight of his helmet heavy under his arm, yet it’s still no match for the weight in the pit of his stomach. 

Finn should have known, Poe thinks.

 

* * *

 

He’s practically non-verbal with animalistic, frightened rage when the droids won’t let him into the med bay, and his world shrinks to the outline of a pair of distinctive black Stormtrooper boots being hurried through the doors to the surgery, before his awareness slowly expands out again to encompass the sheer amount of activity going on inside the sterile area that encompasses the triage lobby. Too many of his pilots hadn’t made it back at all, exploding with their X-Wings, but that doesn’t mean that there’s not still an overwhelming number of injured crowding the walls. Then he understands- he’s not injured enough, he’d only get in the way. He nearly trips over BB-8 bumping into the back of his legs, and sags against a wall to take in the scene for a moment. The Resistance has survived, again, against overwhelming odds, but for the first time that doesn’t settle the hollow feeling in the pit of his stomach as he considers what this victory has cost. He turns and leaves, considering he should probably make his report to the General, if she’s okay with whatever the fuck happened with Kylo Ren. Poe doesn’t feel particularly charitable towards the General, he realises - it might not be her fault that her son is a monster, but her son messed with Poe’s head and now he’s ~~crippled~~ \- _hurt_ Finn, hopefully not mortally. The empty space in Poe’s stomach expands, squeezing his ribcage painfully. He doesn’t have enough room in him for sympathy for her, mentor or not. He turns on his heel and leaves the med bay sharply, BB-8 beeping questioningly in his wake.

 

* * *

 

 

When he finds the General in the map room, though, Poe finds himself headed off at the pass by a stuttering C-3PO, who seems to be even more irritatingly officious than usual.

“Commander Dameron, er, might I advise that now isn’t the best time to report in? Leia - the General, that is - is taking a moment, and I would advise that she not be disturbed.”

Poe growls as he moves to sidestep the droid. BB-8 beeps at his heels and goes still as Threepio blocks his path again, insistently.

“Threepio, I just wanna make my report and get the hell back to the med bay. Finn’s hurt, half the base is crazy -“

“I’m terribly sorry to interrupt you, Commander, but -“

“Not that sorry,” growls Poe,

“-but it appears that Ben has, er, well, that is to say-“

Poe stops his grumbling at the use of Kylo Ren’s birth name, and pauses to listen.

“- there was an altercation between Ben and Han Solo -“

Poe freezes as his brain catches up. Oh no.

“- and you’re saying that Han didn’t make it.”

Threepio rocks back on his heels, nodding, relieved that his protocols regarding informing personnel of deaths, which always seemed so inadequate, hadn’t been tested.

“Yes, sir. And it appears, well... that Ben killed Han.”

Poe blanched.

Shit. Half the pilots on the base had been taking bets on when he would come back, tail between his legs, to apologise to Leia, and for him to have died at the hands of their son right as their rift was appearing to heal, that was- Poe scrubbed at his face with the hand not holding his helmet, realising with a start that it still smelled faintly of the leather of his jacket. From where it had slipped through his fingers earlier.

He wouldn’t let Finn do the same, not when beloved heroes and friends seemed to be dropping out of the sky faster than the Falcon had made the Kessel Run.

Sensing that Poe was distracted, Threepio said gently, “I could inform your BB unit when a more appropriate time appears?”

Poe took this as the dismissal it was, and fled back to his room to strip out of his flightsuit. The smell of leather and the sight of Leia behind Threepio looking small for the first time, staring at nothing, chased him the whole way.

 

* * *

 

 

Finn had never looked small to him either, he realised. Not when he had pressed close to him in the doorway; not when he had felt his warmth at his back watching their six in the tie fighter. Not when he had crowded close to him on the runway, larger than life in his jacket and exploding with excitement at his being alive.

He looks small now, Poe thinks, swathed in white plastic and hooked up to lines of bacta and machines that beep in something he knows isn’t Binary, but seems to make sense to the med droids. His face is ashen and while his face is unlined and peaceful, Poe can see just how many sedatives they’ve hooked to his IV lines to keep him that way. He’s familiar with a few from the times he’s tried to escape the med bay with an injury that he didn’t feel serious enough to merit his sitting there mentally climbing the walls. His hands feel wooden at his sides, but he wouldn’t know where he could put them without hurting. IV lines sprout like vines from Finn’s dark hands, stark against the white blankets. Poe just stares, taking in the beep of the monitors, and hates Kylo Ren more than he thought possible.

BB-8, meanwhile, is rolling around the room trilling and looking over everything, because while it may be an astromech by designation, it’s spent plenty of time in hospital rooms waiting for master-Poe. This one seems adequate, except - the droid tilts its head and rolls halfway around a corner- there! - and speeds off, trilling all the more. Poe is disturbed from his thoughts when he hears a crashing sound from the next room, and the beeping argument in Binary that follows

<-taking hospital property from the incinerator bins is not protocol!> the med droid beeps indignantly. BB-8’s squeal of counterargument rises higher over the top:

<thief-Finn has only one thing and incinerating it would be detrimental to thief-Finn’s wellbeing which is the prime directive of medi-droids and-!>

Poe’s feet carry him to the argument before he registers it, reaching out automatically for Finn’s leather jacket where BB-8 has hooked onto the lining and the medi-droid has suspended it between its pincer-like appendages. The droids look at him expectantly as his fingers fold back the collar and reveal his name embroidered into the lining. 

<master-Poe also owned the jacket first> sniffs BB-8 haughtily.

Faced with the embroidered proof of this fact, the medi-droid throws up its claws and scuttles away, muttering something about disinfecting the item. BB-8 withdraws his hook-cable, shyly rolling on his heels to look up at Poe where he kneels. He pats his astromech on the head absently, looking over the jacket. As he turns it in his hands, standing up, his mouth settles into a grim line when he sees the burnt swathe in the rear panel, and he tries not to link the smell of burnt flesh to his friend where he now lies in a bacta bed.

“I might not be able to do much else right now, but this... this I can fix. Thanks, little buddy.”

The droid chirps at him, happy to see its master striding with purpose again to collect needle and thread.

 

* * *

 

 

Time passes differently in a med-bay, Poe decides. Finn’s jacket is draped over the back of the waiting chair, as he holds up different threads to the light to get a better idea of their colour and tests them for strength by tugging them taut. He’d taken more time than he’d have liked to get back to Finn’s room, but after finding Jessika Pava throwing her helmet around and dragging her hands through her hair while yelling about the loss of Ello to anyone who would listen in the mess hall, Poe knew the detour had been necessary. Pava had relished the chance to have something to do, pressing leather strips she’d been keeping for a rainy day into his hands. He held her gaze evenly and pretended not to notice how Jess’ hands shook. She had appreciated that, he thought.

Thread selected, Poe sat down in the chair and dragged the jacket across his lap. It was still damp from the disinfectant spray the medi-droid had forced BB-8 to take, but at least the smell of burning flesh was mostly gone from it. Pulling one of Jess’ leather strips taut underneath the scarred gash, and using the ragged edges as a guide to match the halves to one another, Poe began to stitch the scarred leather onto it.

“At least that shitty jagged toothpick of a saber is good for something, huh,” he murmured absently to BB-8; “the uneven pattern makes it easier to match back up.”

BB-8 made an incredulous beep that sounded much like a snort, and went to guard the door against the grumpy medi-droid’s return. Poe settled into the chair more, absorbed in his work.

 

* * *

 

 

It’s a day later by the time he finishes the jacket, and though his hands are always steady on the controls in his cockpit, his trigger finger aches with the sustained effort of forcing an unwilling needle through leather. He realises belatedly that he should have slept, probably, but the jacket is done, with neat stitches that speak of the necessity of knowing how to mend. Rey has come by to see Finn, but she hovers in the doorway upon seeing Poe there and has a hushed conversation with BB-8 that Poe mostly ignores. He knows she’s a heroine, that she helped create the hole in the oscillator he’d been able to use to their advantage, but he’s just tired right now, and while she brought Finn back, in his mind she’s also associated with the lightsaber that gave Finn his awful injury. She retreats without introducing herself, and BB-8 rolls over to chastise him for being rude, before beeping at him that now would be a good time to make his report.

Poe leaves the med bay, and tries not to notice the girl in grey slipping into Finn’s room as he does, permitted entry by BB-8. 

**Author's Note:**

> Drabble I’m working on. I wasn’t super satisfied by the way a couple things were handled in TLJ, so consider this a coda fix after the end of TFA I guess? I’ll be filling in the gaps in a way that’s more fulfilling to me. This came out rather more angsty than expected; hopefully will get more uplifting as we go on. Gen for the moment; will update warnings as I go.


End file.
